


i was dressed in embarrassment, i was dressed in wine

by fangirl_squee, perrysian



Series: the ways of the old old wind blowing you back 'round [1]
Category: Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: Friendship, Gen, Roommates, Trans Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-05-11
Updated: 2013-05-11
Packaged: 2017-12-11 12:37:37
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/798800
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fangirl_squee/pseuds/fangirl_squee, https://archiveofourown.org/users/perrysian/pseuds/perrysian
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Marius is currently homeless and wandering nervously before an interview, then he runs into an old friend. Coincidence knocks the wind out of him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	i was dressed in embarrassment, i was dressed in wine

It’s the third week in September, the start of a new semester, and Marius still has no place to live except his car. It’s not the best option, since his car is full of his stuff, and he barely has the room to drive, much less sleep, but it’s all he has.

He has another couple of hours until he’s supposed to meet the girls at the flat off Saint Michel, and he paces along the metro stop on Saint Germain, not wanting to be found loitering outside the place he’s hoping to live. It’s the fifth place he’s looked at so far, and will likely be the fifth place to reject him. If only his childhood friends could see him now, they’d laugh. The world has made a pessimist of Marius.

On his seventh or eighth turn, the girl sitting on a stool at the edge of the alley whistles at him, catching his nervous attention. She’s short, with inky dark hair, stocky frame, barely any chest to speak of, and a face that’s best compliment could be ‘smirkish.’ At least, Marius thinks, she’s not on the ground. At least she isn’t homeless.

And then he remembers he has no room to talk.

“Yes, mademoiselle?”

“Sit for me.”

“What?”

“I want to paint you,” she grins up at him. “You have an oddly handsome face, monsieur. I wish to paint your freckles.”

“Oh. I-”

“Are you waiting for someone?”

“No. I have an appointment in this part of town.”

“A natural Parisian then.”

“How did you know?”

“Only Parisians call this city a town, monsieur.”

So Marius leans against the opposite alley wall, watching her mixing her paints.

“Do you go to school? For painting?”

“No. I go to school for Classics. Painting is my hobby. Learning to make art in study would only lead me to despair it, so I chose a major that will just as likely leave me starving. Living down to expectation, monsieur. And you?”

“Pre-law.”

“That’s a shame.”

“How so?”

“You have the hands of a musician, the bearing of a linguist, and the mouth of a poet, monsieur.”

It strikes him as familiar, this assumption of him, and the remark about music stings. Even out of his grandfather’s house, out of his life, he’s headed down the path his grandfather set for him. But this odd girl couldn’t know that. There’s no way.

“Are you a fortune teller?”

“You mean to ask if I’m a conwoman.”

“No!”

“You do. I don’t blame you. Paris is full of them, and I could very easily have been one.”

“My apologies, mademoiselle.”

“I don’t accept them.”

“No?”

“Marius Pontmercy, you’re a cad and a scoundrel.”

“How do you-” And Marius looks at her, really and truly looks at her. “R?”

“Finally!”

“It’s not my fault,” he protests, “your hair is different!”

“‘A few other things are different about me as well, and I think those are a bit more noticeable.”

“Oh.” His eyes move over her frame quickly. “Yes, I suppose so. But I think your hair looks nice this way.”

She laughed. “I can’t take credit for that, my housemate did it.” She touches one of the braids at side that are keeping the rest of her wild curls back. “She says that it’s either this or I get paint all through them.”

“I suppose some things never change. But I haven’t seen you in ages, not since you changed schools!” He frowns at the memory of Grantaire, there one day and gone the next. He’d gotten a postcard (“I changed school, so I won’t see you again for a while, probably. Have a good time, - R”), which had hardly explained it. “I missed you,” he adds, because it’s the most honest thing he can say about it.

R doesn’t laugh at that, she stands and grips his shoulders so they’re facing each other. “Let me look at you, properly. For the painting.”

He fidgets a little under her gaze. “Why did you leave?”

R’s smile has a bitter edge to it. “My parents felt that it was for the best that I no longer be associated with them, so I went to live with Josephine.”

“Oh.” Marius only had vague memories of Grantaire’s parents, they had often been away for business. He did remember Josephine though, Grantaire’s older sister, good a volleyball, bad at calculus, and had a deep enjoyment of Beatles cover songs.

She releases her grip and sits, ready to paint. “Am I keeping you from your appointment? I can work just as easily off memory.’

Marius checks his phone (he’s tried wearing watches, but he has a tendency to twists the watch strap around his wrist while he thinks, which tend to chafe his wrist and break the strap). “I’m early for it actually, so I have some time. I’m going to view an apartment nearby.”

Her head jerks up from where she’s started to sketch on the canvas. “An apartment?”

“Yes, just near Saint Michel.”

Grantaire hums thoughtfully. “Really?”

“Yes. I hope they haven’t given away the room, the last place I went to had already accepted someone else's offer by the time I got there.”

Grantaire smiles. “Oh, I’m sure that won’t happen.”

“You don’t know my luck with housing.”

She’s started to paint now, quick light brush strokes. “How long have you been looking for?”

“About two weeks? My car is starting to take on strange smell though.”

“Your car? Oh Marius,” she’s smiling at him now, “that is ridiculous.”

“Yeah, but it’s all I have for now.”

“For now.”

Marius watches the curve of her fingers against the brush, and the way it echoed the curve of her smile. 

 

Applicant number one is a lanky guy. His first mistake, obviously, is wearing a suit and tie to the application interview. When Cosette makes a remark about it, the guys looks down his nose slightly from his great height.

“I believe in behaving in a professional manner at all times.”

Grantaire doesn’t even say anything to that, she just reaches across the kitchen bench, pulls out the scissors and cuts his tie in half.

“Thank you for your application,” she says sweetly, “unfortunately it has not been accepted at this time.”

Cosette manages to herd him out the door, spluttering and clutching the pieces of his tie to his chest, before she bursts out laughing.

Applicant number two is a curvaceous redhead girl. She compliments Cosette on her dress, and everything seems to be going well. Grantaire leaves the room to answer a call about a commission, and the girl turns to Cosette.

“You know, he doesn’t really convince me.”

It takes Cosette a second to make the connection. “She.”

The girl frowns. “What?”

“Grantaire is a woman, and she doesn’t need to convince anyone.”

“I only meant -”

“I don’t care what you meant,” says Cosette, making an effort to keep her voice low, “and this interview is over.”

“You can’t just reject me for something like that! I’m sure he must get it all the time.”

Cosette pulls the door open. “Well, maybe your application just doesn’t convince me. Goodbye.”

The girls walks out with a huff, and Cosette slams the door behind her so hard that the shelf next to it shakes.

When Grantaire is finished her phone call, she raises her eyebrows at Cosette. “What was all that slamming about? I thought she seemed nice.”

“She said some awful things about kittens and puppies. And that she hated sunshine and chocolate.”

Grantaire smiles, and Cosette manages to distract her, asking about the commission. 

Grantaire already knows there are awful people in the world, thinks Cosette, she doesn’t need a daily reminder.

The third applicant is almost perfect. They spend a very pleasant ten minutes talking to her about her previous rental history (which is also perfect), and what she’s studying (English Literature and Education).

“This all seems excellent,” says Cosette, “we just have one more part of the process to go through with you before we confirm your application.”

“Okay, sure.”

“We need you to hop on one leg for sixty seconds,” says Grantaire.

The girl blinks at them in surprise, and then laughs nervously.

“No, this is an important part of the process. We need you to do it.”

The girl looks helplessly at Cosette, apparently having decided that there will be help from that quarter. Cosette keeps her faced fixed in the polite-but-interested expression she uses for interviews.

“I,” this is the first time the girl has seemed lost for words, “I’m not going to do that.”

“Oh,” says Cosette, “then I’m sorry, but we won’t be able to accept your application.”

“O - okay.”

She leaves quite quickly after that.

“I told you she wouldn’t go for it,” says Grantaire, holding out one hand.

Cosette sighs and hands over a few notes. “And I had a really good feelings about her jumping ability too.”

Their fourth applicant does not last very long. This is mainly because he seems unaware that they would have done a background check (well, they went on his facebook), and so they are aware of his less than impressive rental history. Normally, this isn’t something that bothers either of them too much, but he claims to have spotless rental history. The phone number he’s given them as his previous landlord is quickly revealed (via some quick googling) to be the number for a take-away (Grantaire does a quick check of facebook, and yes, a few of his friends work there).

“So, tell me,” says Grantaire, “are your hobbies really just the ones you have listed here?”

“Yes,” he says confidently, “I’m a quiet sort, you won’t even know I’m here.”

“Really,” says Cosette, “so your hobbies don’t include getting shitfaced on the weekend with your mates, checking out bitches at the club, and rocking out to Korn?”

Grantaire is honestly surprised at Cosette’s recall sometimes. She’d only looked at his facebook page once yesterday.

“I - what?”

“I’m sorry,” says Cosette, “did you forget to list them? It’s perfectly understandable, you do have quite the list on your profile.”

“You went on my facebook? That’s stalking!”

This time, it’s Grantaire who opens the door. “No, it’s called a background check, and maybe if you ever want to get past one, you should consider not posting every single thought in your head on a social networking site. Or at least set your page to private.”

“You girls are crazy!”

“Well then,” says Cosette, smiling politely, “you certainly don’t want to live with a crazy person. This is probably for the best.”

He slams the door on the way out.

 

Their fifth applicant is Marius. He brings all his paperwork with him in a bright blue folder, which he promptly drops on the floor as soon as they open the door. The pages scatter all over the floor, and Marius blushes.

“It’s good to see you too, Marius,” says Grantaire, kneeling down to help him pick them up.

“R, what are you doing here? This is where I’m having my appointment!”

Grantaire laughs. “I know, it’s with me. Well, me and my housemate Cosette.”

“Hello Marius,” says Cosette cheerfully behind them.

Marius looks up, and immediately drops all the pages he’s just picked up. “Oh.”

Grantaire looks between the both of them, as they stare and smile at each other. Then she excuses herself for five minutes under the guise of making tea. They’re still smiling at each other over the pages when she’s finished.

“Shall we start the application interview now?”

Cosette hands the remaining pages back to Marius.

“Oh, no, um, these are for you. It said on the notice that you guys needed past rental history and things, so I printed them out.”

“Well that certainly makes you our most prepared candidate so far,” says Cosette, managing to take her eyes off Marius to flick through the pages.

“Yes, I think we just really have one question,” says Grantaire, grinning.

“Sure,” says Marius.

“Can you hop on one leg for sixty seconds?” says Grantaire.

“Right now?” says Marius.

“Whenever you’re ready,” says Cosette.

Marius switches legs half-way through, but he does hop for the full sixty seconds.

He moves in that afternoon.


End file.
